Advice (from someone more qualified than me)

[16,524 / 50,000]

Over on the Genreality blog Carrie Vaughn posts "The best advice [she] ever got" about working as a writer.

I make no secret that I love genre fiction, and the people over at Genreality (Genre-Reality) do just that. Actually, they cover more genres than I write or care to read in but whatev.

I'm a chronic "grass is greener" type person. Whatever I'm doing, I fantasize that if I could only be doing something else things would be better -- no, things would be perfect.

Ha. What can I say--I have a good imagination.

Part of it is the fantasy of next semester and what I can get done then, but the other part of it (perhaps the bigger part) is that whenever I'm out of school I want to be in school, and whenever I'm in school I want to be out of school so that I can write and not bother with anything but writing. At the moment I just want to write genre fiction. I think it has to do with wanting to write whatever it is that I'm not writing at the moment. Or at least that's what the "grass is greener" syndrome would dictate.

I rather think it has to do with how many sections of composition I'm teaching and that encroaching on my writing time. I'd like to teach fewer sections, but fewer sections means more mooching off my parents. Although, with the budget cuts around here the choice might not be mine.

I'd love to teach creative writing -- fewer students, staggered grading instead of landslides of it; there's more prep for each class but I could deal with that and still be able to write. That sounds like greener grass, right?

NaNoWriMo Day 8: Confused

[15,442 / 50,000]

I have stopped writing a single project. Yep, it's already happened. I am only one week into the month long marathon and I'm jumping ships, or tracks, or running off the course -- whatever the appropriate metaphor is in this situation.

I started out counting only the words I wrote on a fiction project and have now switched all my attention back over to the memoir project (and sub-projects) I am doing for workshop. It helps that the memoir projects are probably going to reach 50,000 words by the end of semester. Now my goal is to get them drafted as quickly as possible.

There are those who would like to point out that jumping tracks mid-month goes against the "rules" of NaNo. Those people need to lighten up. If I can turn out 50,000 words total by Thanksgiving then I will be very happy and I don't particularly care how I do it.

Ad of the Week

The Fantasy of "Next Semester"

[6,628 / 50,000]

A recent post at Allison Writes got me thinking about the fantasy of "next semester." I have always, always fantasized that next semester I will be on top of things. Next semester I will do every reading thoroughly for every class. I will grade papers promptly. I will give better lectures. I will finish short stories before the semester starts so that what I turn in to workshop is the absolutely most edited thing I can produce.

Instead I end up in situations like I am in now, where I am keeping my head above water. [I had written the sentence "just barely keeping my head above water" but the truth is that I'm a doing smidge better than "just barely" so I cut that phrase.]

I've been turning in things to workshop that I have written only just this semester. In fact, I turned in something this week that I wrote the night before. Not because it was due but because I wanted to get it out of me and onto the page and (for some reason) out in front of the group while I was still feeling energetic. Unfortunately the group now has two weeks to look at it before they talk to me and I'm certain I'll feel it is poo in two weeks time. In that piece I also committed what I believe are errors that I did NOT fix, because a perverse part of me wants affirmation that those things were wrong. I want to know that the error I wanted to fix really was an error.

Is it perverse, or is it my learning process? Isn't this what toddlers do? They think they know what's right and what's wrong so they do something and say "uh-oh!" and see if their parents say "uh-oh" or get mad or if the rents are cool with it. Trial and error. Action, reaction, alteration of behavior.

Realistically this is a good time for me to be doing it. First off, during the MFA is a great time to try and fail because you get instant feedback and instruction. (Thankfully I signed on for a three year not two year program.) Second, it's good because this semester I'm producing and turning in almost exclusively nonfiction pieces of writing. I believe I've written about this on this blog before, but when I work in nonfiction the writing goes faster because I don't have to come up with characters I just have to remember them. I don't have to imagine the conflict and then debate whether it is believable or not because I know it did happen and by positing it as truth at the beginning people will be more willing to believe the unbelievable. Although what I'm writing about is not all that unbelievable in my opinion.

But what all that means is that when I go back to writing fiction I will have to do prep work. My list of Things to Do/Write/Read Over Winter Break keeps getting longer and longer and ...

Day 4: Interrupting this program...

No new words last night because for the first half od the day I felt under the weather then later that evening I went to Post Secret.

As Frank Warren asked, What's you're crazy idea? It's probably not as crazy as the people you tell it to will say it is.

NaNoWriMo Day 3: Tired but On Track

[6,628/50,000]

When I started writing this post I was sitting on the couch with the kitten sleeping cutely beside me. Now she's awake and purring--which is still cute, but she's investigating which is not quite as conducive to writing as I would like. She's not technically a kitten anymore, but as a kitten she demonstrated to me that whiskers singe very easily. Since then I've been very careful to keep lit candles in places she can't go explore. The result is that she now has whiskers as long as lobster antennae. I believe that cat's whiskers usually cover an area large than the cat's head (this only makes sense given their purpose) but my cat has a fluffy mane surrounding her head and then whiskers that stretch out wider than the mane. We're talking about 5" long whiskers here!

So enough about the cat -- though I'm still floored by those long whiskers.

Yesterday my composition students and I had our first day of in-class novel writing. I managed about 2k of words and felt pretty good about that, but some of my students turned out 3k in just 45 minutes! I'm, again, floored.

The writing in class seems to be going well. We write (type) in complete silence for fifteen minutes and then everyone gets their word count written on the board. If you're over the threshold number then you get candy. Then there's a 5-12 minute break where students can regroup, stretch, go to the bathroom, or keep writing if that's what they want to do before we start all over again.

I'm on pace to "shoot the bird" and that's exciting, particularly because I stayed up the entire night between Monday and Tuesday to write 3/4 of a non-fiction essay for one of my workshops. I did manage to get some sleep but I wasn't in bed until 6:00 a.m. and boy did that take a toll on my body that I was not prepared for.

The strange thing of it is that I did not have to finish that essay that night for any reason. And, in truth, I didn't finish the essay. But I turned it in despite having another week to work on it. I have no idea why I did that, but it felt right at the time so I went with it. I went with my energy.

I went with my energy because I am fairly certain that's the kind of energy I have to have if I want to make a living as a writer: I cannot rely on other people's deadlines. I have this notion that I must write swiftly and frequently. Yes, I must then edit meticulously, but if the writing is not abundant to begin with then there is nothing to edit and nothing to send out and certainly nothing to publish.

Other NaNoWriMo accounts worth reading:
Lynn Vhiel PBWriter -- Midweek NaNo update
Lynn Vhiel Day by Day

NaNoWriMo Day 1: Obsessed

[4,027 / 50,000 words]

Day One of NaNoWriMo 2009 is done and gone. At the suggestion of Chris Baty I attempted to "go big early" and create a buffer on day one with a "double up" challenge suggested by one of my online writing groups.

I did writing and outlining. I recently entered a competition that asked for a synopsis and (unlike many) it turns out that I kind of like synopses. There are many writers that hate writing them because they write them after writing the novel and then they have to boil the entire novel down into ten or five or (heaven forbid) two double spaced pages. But when you're writing the synopses at the beginning of the writing process it's a chance for you to concentrate on the character's motivations and the tensions between them and any external elements that come to play (and create more conflict) in the novel.

And -- excitement! -- I figured out how I'm tying together the larger threads in the novel to form a climatic ending. This is very important when your novel features a witch, a mafia, the ghost of a werewolf, a talking cat, a preternatural inn and very, very, very tiny pirates that live on a ship in a bottle.

And no, I'm not writing the first draft of my MFA thesis this month.

I desperately need to get tickets to the Post Secret event that's coming to town this week. Must do that! Must also get a flu shot! For some reason all the places around here are canceling clinics or having really weird limited hours -- and I just want a regular, season flu shot! Must go find candy and prizes for my students for when we meet and word war. I promised them prizes and fame for their novelling efforts and I plan to deliver. Must grade and must write another 2000 words. It'll be a busy Monday.

I have decided to attempt something I'm calling "shooting the bird." It's a combination of phrases I've heard, some in relation to NaNoWriMo and some in relation to the card game Hearts. Much like "shooting the moon," I'm trying to go big or go home by writing 2,000 words a day between Nov. 1 and Thanksgiving. Thus, on Turkey Day (the bird) I will have finished (shot) the novel. I could be reeeaaaly stupid.

Suggested reading: Other people's accounts (or non-accounts) of NaNo.
Just My Thoughts -- (she earns bonus points for working in the phrase "a bee's dick behind")
Editor Unleased -- NaNoWriMo: Writing with the Bulls
Rarely Likeable -- Dear NaNoWriMo
the INTERN -- NaNoReVisMo

NaNoWriMo is Upon Us

[1880/50,000 words]

From the Piers Anthony pep talk:

Dear Writer,

You're a fool. You know that, don't you? Because only a fool would try a stunt as crazy as this. You want to write a 50,000 word novel in one month?! Do you have sawdust in your skull? When there are so many other more useful things you could be doing, like cleaning up the house and yard, taking a correspondence course in Chinese, or contributing your time and effort to a charitable cause? Whatever is possessing you?

Consider the first card of the Tarot deck, titled The Fool. There's this young man traipsing along with a small dog at his heel, toting a bag of his worldly goods on the end of his wooden staff, carrying a flower in his other hand, gazing raptly at the sky—and about to step off a cliff, because he isn't watching his feet. A fool indeed. Does this feel familiar? It should. You're doing much the same thing. What made you ever think you could bat out a bad book like that, let alone write anything readable?

So are you going to give up this folly and focus on reality before you step off the cliff? No? Are you sure? Even though you know you are about to confirm the suspicion of your dubious relatives, several acquaintances, and fewer friends that you never are going to amount to anything more than a dank hill of beans? That you're too damned oink-headed to rise to the level of the very lowest rung of common sense?

Sigh. You're a lost soul. So there's no help for it but to join the lowly company of the other aspect of The Fool. Because the fact is, that Fool is a Dreamer, and it is Dreamers who ultimately make life worthwhile for the unimaginative rest of us. Dreamers consider the wider universe. Dreamers build cathedrals, shape fine sculptures, and yes, generate literature. Dreamers are the artists who provide our rapacious species with some faint evidence of nobility.

(read more)

MFAers who are also NaNoers?

I'm curious as to how many people embarking on NaNo either have a degree in writing or are currently working on one.

Of course, no one needs a degree to write -- but many of us get that degree so that we can teach writing/composition and occasionally literature at the college level.

So I'm curious to know if you're out there and if so, how you're using NaNo. Are you writing for your MFA thesis or writing for your own side projects? Sticking with the standard MFA genre of "literary" fiction or moving out into popular genres during the month of November.

In love with an essay

Check out Alexander Chee's essay "Annie Dillard and the Writing Life." I'm in love with this essay. I plan on saving it and giving it to my creative writing students to read ... when I eventually have creative writing students to whom I assign readings.

And, interestingly enough, Dillard, though Chee, finally articulates a reason for literary writers disliking gerunds. Previously it had been one of those "just avoid such-n-such" rules that I had headed but not understood.